


Brute

by White_Rainbow



Category: Star Wars Episode V: Empire Strikes Back, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: Thrawn - Timothy Zahn
Genre: Fluff and Angst, M/M, Red String of Fate, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-25
Updated: 2017-08-25
Packaged: 2018-12-19 22:35:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11907600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/White_Rainbow/pseuds/White_Rainbow
Summary: For PhoenixxWispp's Prompt: Soulmate follows the red string of Fate into a dark place to find it attached to a monster.





	Brute

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PhoenixxWispp](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PhoenixxWispp/gifts).



> Follow me on Tumblr: [White Rainbow](http://white-rainbowff.tumblr.com/)  
> 

Thrawn stood in the eternal winter landscape of Hoth watching the red thread of fate disappear into the head of the AT-AT’s charred remains. 

He was afraid of what he would find within the fallen Imperial. But if Max was alive…

At first all he can see are a shattered helmet, a broken breastplate, and shreds of the general’s uniform. He followed the string deeper. Movement caught his eye in the dark corner of the cockpit. It is in that very corner that the string ends.

Glowing green eyes stare at him. 

Pearly white fangs glint menacingly.

“Stay away.”

The icy cockpit was a furnace compared to the cold that froze Thrawn’s blood.

“Max…” he breathed.

“D…do not look at me.” It was Max’s voice. Low and parched and shivering from the cold, but unmistakable. 

“What has happened to you?”

“I do not remember.”

“How long have you been here?”

“I do not know.”

“Can you move?”

The creature trembled, his breath coming out in thick clouds.  “I…d…do not want to.”

Thrawn realized the creature was wearing nothing, his bulky form too large for the uniform that once protected him. Max’s skin took on a blue tinge and ice formed on a pair of long black horns lined with emerald veins.

Slowly, Thrawn took off his white overcoat and knelt beside the demon. Max’s eyes flashed dangerously as it came down around his shoulders. Thrawn noticed the claws that gripped the coat, smearing ash on the white fabric. 

“Then we shall not move,” Thrawn decided. “Not until you are ready.”

“You will freeze.” 

“I have lived in much colder,  _ch’eo v-._ ” His voice hitched. Never did he imagine he would say that term of endearment again. This all felt like a dream. He kept checking his hand, fearful the string would dissipate and he would wake up. 

It remained. The demon looked at it too, his eyes tracing it back to his own claws.

“I am not myself. I feel…everything…my rage, your grief, our fear.” He let out a soft snarl and grabbed at his chest. The skin was red and raw as if he had been clawing at his own heart. “I want to…destroy…I do not know if I can control this…”

Thrawn forced a smile. “Unable to control your rage? It sounds very much like the same brute who likes to pick bar fights when someone insults my honor.”

The demon gazed at the chiss. Thrawn’s heart ached to see Max’s hazel green orbs beneath a sheen of ethereal light. “You do not fear me…”

“I do not.”

“You will not leave me.”

“I do not intend to, no.”

They sat for a few hours there in the quiet of the fallen walker. The first half-hour Thrawn ventured to put a hand on Max’s arm and received a feral growl. 

The second half-hour, he sat a little closer and earned from the demon a warning snarl. 

By the end of the second hour, Thrawn had managed to touch the demon’s face without being snapped at.

By the third hour, Max had grabbed Thrawn and enveloped him, clutching him tight as if afraid Hell itself would open up and take him again.

Eventually, Thrawn would find a way to help his soulmate. Eventually, he would concoct a clever plan to ease his soulmate’s volatile soul. Eventually, he would shed the fear that frosted his heart.

For now Thrawn was just content to be held just a bit longer and know that the the red string was not going to vanish once again.


End file.
